Rhythm permeates everyone’s life. It is in everything we do, we sec, we .feel, and it is within the circadian rhythms of our bodies, as well. Rhythm is a fact of life. -Arthur Hull
Finding Your Drum
In order for you to fully experience the depth of the benefits that drumming provides, you need to play the drum for yourself. Finding your drum can be a joyful endeavor. There are many possible goals in seeking out your first hand drum.
The first decision is whether to look for a drum that reflects your personality as it is now or to find a drum that reflects the personality you are trying to Cultivate. Is it to be used for building your confidence? Deepening trance' Movement? Healing? Each intention may set your path towards a different drum. Once y0m are clear about your intention, then trust the direction you choose. Allow your intuitive mind to direct you.
Do you want a large djembe or conga drum whose booming sound can express your self-confidence and power, or a frame drum whose voice is more subtle and nuanced? Do you want a drum that produces sonorous, majestic Sounds or a "talking drum" that can express your feelings through a variety of tones? Do you want a colorful playful drum or a simple wooden drum? Do you want an ashiko drum from Africa or a ceramic doumbek drum from the Middle East? In each case, you will want a drum that feels right, has the right touch and the right feel for you. Do you want a drum that is made from cherry wood or a drum that is manufactured andhas an attractive design.' Don't rush the process! Hit the drum, make a sound. Hit it in various ways. If you will be carrying the drum a lot, you may want a lighter drum, perhaps a single-headed buffalo drum or bodhran.
Sometimes individuals will use the drum to help them attain a higher state of consciousness. Some people call this evolved state, the "higher self." This aspect of self has qualities such as kindness, compassion and love. When you choose the path of the drum as a way to seek your higher self, it is important that the drum you choose be one that reflects that Self that you are seeking, in color, size, sound and vibration. In this way, it is important to trust your instincts and not get caught in another's ideas about what you need.
Drumming Alone
When you play your hand drum alone, there are numerous benefits. Your drum can help you develop creative expression. It can also be used as a tool to quiet your inner voices, for instance, self-criticism, fear or doubt. Drums can also help to unlock the emotional blocks that you may have, that may be repressed or suppressed within. There are exercises at the end of this site designed to assist in that process, though I always recommend when dealing with the emotional process to work directly with a trained music therapist or counselor.
Drumming in a Group
Playing drums with a group of people or even one other person has enormous benefits. The drum can be the ultimate non-verbal communication tool. When you play in a drum circle or with other
individuals, you need to learn to both listen and play, always being aware of what the group is creating and your place in it. This form of playing can be quite inspirational. In many drum circles that I have attended, a group synergy is created that unifies and transcends the individuals involved. I have seen many circles where when the rhythm has ended, the silence creates an extremely positive feeling in the room from which nobody wants to leave. It is asif something sacred is touched through drumming, creating a remembrance within each person that within each of us is an inner silence that we can
Playing the drum with others has additional benefits. Playing the drum can help you to build confidence and self-esteem. It can be used to release negative emotions, such as anger, into a safe venue, though it is always important to not hurt yourself hitting the drum when working with painful emotions.
Drumming with others provides a simple yet profound interaction.
Communicating without words is the simplest way to communicate. When drumming in a group, we communicate non-verbally-with a look, a gesture, body language and the sounds of our beats.
Sometimes these expressions are more honest and complete than anything we can say in words.
Hitting a drum with others allows for an easy expression of emotions, of anger, joy or community team spirit or whatever an individual may be feeling.
Drumming provides a way of communicating that is beyond prejudice, beyond judgment. It is through the drum that children who do not have an easy use of language and articulation can be heard, their anger felt and shared with others.
Whether we play with others or alone, the drum provides the perfect communication tool, unencumbered by the restrictions of verbal language, and creating an environment where your emotions can flow freely.
Your Joyful Inner Child
AY is not in things, it is in us. -Benjamin Franklin
Your "joyful inner child" is that part of you that loves to play, anytime and anywhere, and has the qualities of innocence and trust. It is spontaneous and always eager to have fun. Eventually we learned to squelch this part of ourselves as we became adults and took our requisite "serious-training."
When we were in kindergarten, we did not have the same rule, that we now have as adults. We didn't think about who was watching us and what they thought or how we would be judged.
The joyful inner child is an aspect we can learn to reclaim as we let go Of our self-judgments and give ourselves permission to move beyond the constraints of adulthood. It is that part of us that we include as we recognize that, in order to be healthy, we must learn to cultivate our ability to play and live joyfully. The drum can be a delightful catapult towards this goal.
When I encourage my workshop participants to give themselves the freedom to relax and let go into the drum, to make-believe that they are kindergartners, magic seems to happen. When adults allow themselves to remember the best experiences of being a child, a more natural self seems to emerge who is trusting, happy and relaxed.
Current research points to the importance of the quality of play to maintain our health. As Hara Estroff Marano describes in her article, "The Power of Play" in Psychology Today, play keeps us mentally flexible, promotes creativity and reduces anxiety, and provides many documented health benefits.
Marano cites a study of a group of gifted individuals begun in the 1920's which shows that those who are enjoying the greatest longevity are those who have played the most throughout their lives.
The drum provides the perfect outlet for the joyful inner child to play because it requires no training to create exuberant and expressive sounds. Through allowing yourself to simply hit a drum, you then begin a cascading effect in which this instrument becomes the first step in trusting yourself, taking risks, and allowing spontaneous self-expression.
This story by drumming facilitator, Jim Greiner, describes an experience in which a burly farmer has a close encounter with the drum and discovers his joyful inner child.
Heartland Community Drumming - Jim Greiner
In the mid-1990's I was contracted to lead a community drumming program for a major farm belt city's annual civic festival. I was told that they wanted something that would bring people together in a feeling of community celebration to add to their regular line-up of bands, food booths and local merchants. I was also told to not expect too many people to actually participate asthis was, after all,
"heartland America," and not exactly prune t, trying new things." I replied that I learned a long time ago not to expect too little from people when it comes to celebrating community; that, when given an opportunity, people will rise to . level of participation far greater than even they expect. I hoped 1 was right!
Over 200 people arrived to play! The organizers were astounded. I was amazed. The people who came to drum were ecstatic! I saw people Iaughing, pointing to one another and saying variations of, "I didn't know you drummed, too!" Coworkers, acquaintances and even members of the same church learned for the first time of each other's love for the drum.
They also realized that there had been an unspoken assumption that they had to hide their drumming from Other people because they were concerned that they Would be thought Of 31 "different." So they drummed by themselves or in small groups, hidden away from disapproving eyes (or ears). That alone was a profound realization for us all.
As I led the group in the first rhythm, assigning appropriate parts to the different families of drums and percussion instruments, 1 could see more than just a bunch of people drumming together for fun (which is reason enough!). I saw people coming together as a community in the truest sense, that is, a group of people contributing their individual natures and skills to shared goal.
Other people came, drawn by the powerful groove and obvious atmosphere of celebration, until there were several hundred onlookers Surrounding the drummers.
I started them clapping and singing along with the rhythm until almost 500 people were involved. I caught the eye of one of the organizers who gave me a look that said as clearly as if he had spoken into my ear, "Did I say not to expect too much? I can't believe what I'm seeing!"
Someone later sent me a series of photos of the event with a note that read, "Check out the farmer on the edge of the group on the right side." I looked at the photos, smiling, being reminded by them of the fun we all had that day, and at re-learning (for the umpteenth time!) the lesson of letting go of
preconceived expectations. I then looked for the person who was described by the note-writer. I found him on the Outer run of onlookers.
He was in has late 50’s, a beefy, strongly built man whit skin burnt by endless hours spent working in the sun, wearing a baseball cap with a "John Deere" patch. In the first of the photos he stood with his arms folded over his chest, leaning slightly back on the heels of his feet and with an expression on his face that said clearly, "What the heck are these people doing!?" In a later shot he had his hands on his hips as he stood more straight up and down with a curious look on his face. In a later photo he was leaning forward at the waist clapping his hands and had an enormous grin on his face.
I've always wanted to meet that man and ask him what he thought about the drumming and what we all shared that day. I admire him for allowing the spirit of the event to move him, even though it was clearly something new and completely foreign to him. I remember him, and all the members of that heartland drumming community who allowed themselves to be moved by a spirit of community celebration whenever I find myself holding hack from trying something just because it's new or different. From then on the term "heartland" always had a new meaning for me.
In some ways, we are a11 like the burly farmer when we are faced with something outside of our
"comfort zone." It is socialization that teaches us to mistrust the new and different. Socialization also teaches us that it is the child who needs to learn from the adults, yet "reverse socialization" is a phrase I have coined that states that we as adults need to learn from our children. Somehow in learning how to be adults, we forget the wisdom of the child. There is great wisdom is trusting ourselves and allowing our spontaneity to express itself in the world.
In truth, the only elements that get in the way of allowing ourselves to embrace this joyful and playful inner child are Our own inner boundaries, fears and beliefs. Perhaps we believe if we were to have more fun and let this inner child out, we would he laughed at by those adults who really took their
"serious training" seriously. Or perhaps we have gotten so used to not enjoying life that we think that this is normal, particularly when we see everyone else not enjoying life along with us. As adults, many have lost touch with a deep and ever-present need to experience lightness, glee, trust and simple fun.
In our "serious training," we have forgotten these primary requirements for well-being. When we are eighty years old, we will not remember our day-to-day working hours, but rather we will remember those moments when joy smiled upon us.
It is the quality of abandon that adults need to cultivate and nurture. In my workshops, one of the goals I have for my participants is to remember the feeling of being in kindergarten. I once offered my drumming program to a group of thirty school teachers. Although they were very resistant to letting go, I gave them drums and asked them to risk being playful. Their resistance was short-lived, for within a short time of doing various drumming exercises, they danced and drummed with abandon.
The drum had allowed each one to open to the joyful inner child that existed within. As a drumming facilitator, it is my responsibility to be that which I wish to teach, therefore, by showing the teachers that I was willing to be my own inner child, uninhibited and playful, they were able to risk being theirs.
As a psychotherapist, it has become very obvious to me that many conflict, are due to anger and pain which may represent Unspoken thoughts and emotions. Some of these are based , communications, neglect, anger, inconsiderations, and a miryad of other causes. Therefore, any tool that can foster positive communication between people should be explored.
The drum is an excellent tool for working through family for a number of reasons. Due to the drum's working on a m bal level, it transcends the blockages that hinder communication Also, the drum can allow negative emotions such anger to be released. Ideally, a music therapist would assist in this process.
Thus, through drumming out conflict, or simply drumming have fun, a family opens up the possibility of a new kind of communication which can provide an environment of greater intimacy. Since
drumming is fun, it can provide a family with alighter atmosphere in which conflicts can be more easily resolved and harmony increased.
The Psychology of Drumming
When one looks back over human existence however, it is very evident that all culture has developed through an initial resistance against adaptation to the reality in which man find, himself -Beatrice Hinkle, Psychiatrist
There are numerous psychological benefits in drumming. First sense of personal power. The sound of a drum is power made many fast . Second, the drum places one squarely in the here and
When a person is worrying, he or she is generally caught in the web of the future or the past. Through hitting a drum, an individual is transported out of the mind and into the body's solidity Hitting the drum is an absolute definitive action. When hitting the drum, t here Is no time to think about
tomorrow’s fears ,yesterday’s regrets or what’s for dinner. The drum places an individual in the present and sacred moment. In this way, the drum is very grounding.
When people play the drum they should try to not hold back in any way; thus the drum becomes an opportunity for those who repress their emotions to release them, for individuals, both men and women, who censor themselves to have full and total ( nonverbal) expression.
When working whit deep emotional issues it is always recommended to do so with a therapist or music therapist who can support you through the process. I recommended using drum that use mallet or stick when working with releasing emotions since it is herder to hurt your hands with them. Paddle drum buffalo drum, drum sets, timbales and electronic drums, are some of the drum that use mallets or sticks.
In our society, full and total expression on any lever is an extraordinary gift, for many of us censor our thoughts and hold back our feelings. One of the gifts that the drum provides is the opportunity to communicate freely.
That the drum can provide a release of unexpressed emotions is related in a story by a gentleman who attended one of many drumming programs.
The Emotional Surprise - Thomas Willett
I came to Robert's drumming class because I had just purchased a drum and wanted to begin to learn how to use it. I had in mind to learn the basics so that I could go to a community drumming circle. We began his class with relaxation exercises to the sound of the buffalo drum. I came directly from a long day of work and with the lights down and the sound of the drum and his encouragement, I was able to do the breathing and relaxation exercises. I found that the sound of the drum, the cadence, the lingering aftertones helped me to relax and focus on deep breathing and letting go of body tension.
He started us all on the simplest of rhythms. To my surprise, the other participants were able to almost immediately begin to do them. He kept the lights down low, and we began to slowly drum in unison to a slightly more complex beat. To our general beat, he improved and led us along.
As the class began to come together, and we all became more used to doing the more complex rhythms, I found that I could relax and just drum, without having to worry about missing too many beats and without fear I could not get back to the rhythm. The lights were low; we had been drumming for about 45 minutes, and the class had a feeling of "flow" or group unity, andthere was a strong male lead against which I could play and rely. As I began to go deeper into just drumming without thinking, I experienced a surprising wave of emotional sadness.
Even at the time I experienced it, I was quite surprised. I had trough of drumming as a kind of wild release of energy or tension. I never expected to find drumming to help me release the sadness that I already knew I was crying around. If anything, I trough that drumming would be an escape from
Even at the time I experienced it, I was quite surprised. I had trough of drumming as a kind of wild release of energy or tension. I never expected to find drumming to help me release the sadness that I already knew I was crying around. If anything, I trough that drumming would be an escape from